Post Event Syndrome

For five months, I have lived and breathed all things WEDDING.

Now it's over.

Our families have left. Beds have been changed. Gifts have been opened. Even our skin has thrown in the towel and begun to peel from our Mexican honeymoon. The children have returned and once again, their bedrooms look like wastelands. I opened one of our credit card bills the other day and had to put my head between my knees.

Apparently, this is the big exhale; the time of thank you notes and harsh buckets of cold reality.

And it bites.

There should be readily available pharmaceuticals out there to help manage Post Event Syndrome. It's like a child's Christmas Day on steroids: big build up, massive planning, the tingle of anticipation and then...

*blink*

...it's Monday morning in the office.

I would like a pill to take me back to the moment when I glanced over at my three cousins and realized that they were in matching t-shirts that said, "cousin of the bride". Like most everything the week of the wedding, this sweet gesture overwhelmed me.

We held the rehearsal dinner at one of our local restaurants and I remember looking around that room and realizing how impossibly fortunate we were to have every person that really matters to us together in one place. I wanted to consciously savour each second and burn that evening into my memory to replay over and over.

Sentimental?

Hell, yes. Like a sappy Hallmark card. But Dallas and I both had trouble shaking the dreamlike quality of the fortnight leading up to the wedding. He'd lean over and say, "Look at that", pointing to our mothers and how surreal it was to watch them connect. Or we'd glance into the backyard to witness the men in our combined families mingling over beer and BBQ. Weddings, like most life changing events, have a way of clarifying things.

For example, my biological sister chose not to attend or even acknowledge my nuptials in any way except with a short note written on her RSVP. One of my closest friends, who lives in California, backed out of her wedding party duties less than a month before Dallas and I were set to walk down the aisle. Both events stung a bit but if I were honest with myself, I wasn't terribly surprised. I suppose that subconsciously, (where all the uglies go to fester) I have known that the landscape of those bonds had shifted. Relationships are sometimes like an old, comfortable t-shirt. We often hold onto them long after they're full of holes.

On the other hand, I had relatives from all over Canada who made the trip, at considerable expense, to support me. It is profoundly humbling to understand that I rank on their totem pole of priorities. And believe me, their attendance was no small sacrifice because there is nothing much to do in my town except watch the grass grow and count abandoned chicken coops. Eight people from New Zealand came which speaks volumes about my husband. People used language like, "We wouldn't have missed it for the world". And then there were our friends. Plainly put, we would NOT have survived without them. Period.

So, in the absence of some sort of narcotic to numb the sharp pricklies of a life returned to status quo, I look forward to spending hours reviewing the nearly 1500 pictures that were taken in the last month. These are just a few. They make me smile.

My Sisters

The Boys

Cozumel